5 books on man's best friend

I can't exactly put my finger on why; but their adorable laziness, unabashed friendliness and constant happiness just puts me at ease.

In high school, I spent my Saturdays volunteering with PAWS Chicago, the city's largest no kill adoption center. We would take the dogs to malls and street fairs to drum up interest in the organization and, hopefully, get some of the dogs adopted.

One day I was paired with a Shar Pei mix named Pepsi. She had been beaten so badly that she lost eye sight in one eye and was then abandoned by her owners. All day Pepsi calmly sat in the shade and licked the hands of whoever stopped to meet her. I was so surprised by this dog's ability to overcome her hardships and understandable fear of people. I thought about how many times I had complained and thrown a fit when something didn't go my way, which in the face of Pepsi's hardships seemed totally insignificant, and I was honestly embarrassed. By the end of the day, I decided that I would live life like Pepsi; not holding grudges, keeping my worries to a minimum and, only occasionally, licking people.

In celebration of Pepsi and adopt-a-shelter dog month here are some books, all released in the last year, about man's best friend:

"Oogy: The Dog Only a Family Could Love"By Larry LevinGrand Central Publishing, $19.99, 224 pages

The day that Larry Levin and his two sons are going to put down their beloved cat, they meet a dog. In the waiting room he bounds toward them almost as if he knew their spirits needed lifting. But this dog was a bit different; he was missing an ear and had scar tissue covering his most of his face. The family soon learns that the dog, named Oogy, had been saved from a dog-fighting ring and dropped off at the hospital barely clinging to life. The rest of the book details how both Oogy and the Levins are affected by the new influx of love in their lives.

On an especially cold night, dog walking is a chore that I like to finish quickly, but John Zeaman reminds me of what I miss when I take these opportunities of peace for granted. This memoir tells the story of Zeaman walking his family's dog and what he learns by taking daily walks where all he can do is ponder. Zeaman dutifully describes the intricacies of dogs, dog walking, dog walkers, and the world he discovers on his walks. Each chapter has its own theme and the book almost acts as a collection of essays, but the over-arching motif is the unwavering love between man and dog.

"Inside of a Dog" begins with a detailed description of what it is like to be a dog - to walk on four legs, live 18 inches off the ground and have extremely high olfactory senses. Horowitz really tries to put you in the mind of a dog, which as a psychology professor who studied ethology, the science of animal behavior, she does pretty well. The book uses psychological research techniques to answer pressing dog questions like why a bicycle must be chased and what it is like to use your mouth to carry things.

This book opens with what seems like a sketch from "Saturday Night Live:" The Hawkins receive their newest foster dog, a giant and very excited ex-guard dog, and are trying to get him under control when a school bus full of cub scouts led by a vicar arrive. In the middle of all that craziness, an old lady who is collecting for charity shows up to add to the scene. In the end, all of the characters have to help herd the new dog to his new pen. The book goes on to tell the story of the Hawkins' first year fostering orphaned German Shepherds. It continues with plenty of funny anecdotes and will warm even the coldest heart with the obvious love that the Hawkins' have gained for their new, and very appreciative, housemates.

Susannah Charleston was so moved by a newspaper photo, an exhausted search-and-rescue officer with his face buried in his canine helper's fur surrounded by the horror of the Oklahoma City bombing, that she decided to become a volunteer with a local canine rescue team. She took intense classes to learn how to train dogs and adopted a dog named Puzzle who, as she writes, grows from "a fuzzy tator tot" to a full-blown rescue dog. The book tells the story of this partnership from the beginning to the present with truly gripping tales of the pair searching for people caught up in horrible situations.